_Economy and Finance

Rating Action: Moody's affirms Sabine Pass Liquefaction's upsized $1.5 billion senior secured notes. Outlook remains stable. Global Credit Research - 29 Jan 2013 Approximately $6 billion of debt affected New York, January 29, 2013 -- Moody's Investors Service affirmed Sabine Pass Liquefaction's (SPL) Ba3 rating on its upsized $1.5 billion of senior secured notes due 2021. The senior secured note offering was previously sized at $1 billion. Moody's also affirmed SPL's Ba3 on its $3.6 billion first lien bank term loan due 2019 and Sabine Pass LNG's (SPLNG) B1 rating on its $2.1 billion in senior secured notes. The rating outlooks for SPL and SPLNG are stable. http://www.moodys.com/credit-ratings/Sabine-Pass-Liquefaction-LLC-credit-rating-823099178

EUROPE BUSINESS NEWS | MARCH 10, 2011, 3:57 A.M. ET Moody's Downgrades Spain By EVA SZALAY And TERENCE ROTH LONDON—Moody's Investor Service Inc. on Thursday downgraded Spanish government debt to Aa2 with a negative outlook from Aa1 previously, triggering sharp declines for the euro and European bond prices in early European trading.

ECONOMY |MARCH 7, 2011, 1:28 P.M. ET Moody's Downgrades Greece By NATASHA BRERETON And ALKMAN GRANITSAS SINGAPORE—Moody's Investors Service Inc. lowered Greece's credit rating by three notches Monday and signaled it could cut the rating even further, dragging the country's debt deeper into junk-grade territory.

Related News: U.S. · Bonds · Municipal Bonds Risk of Widespread Municipal Bond Defaults Near `Zero,' Moody's Zandi Says By Mark Niquette and William Selway - Feb 28, 2011 6:22 AM GMT+0900 Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Analytics. Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg Dire warnings about impending defaults in the municipal-bond market are overblown, an economist and analyst told a group of the nation’s governors. The risk of a major default or round of defaults is “close to zero,” Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody’s Analytics Inc. in West Chester, Pennsylvania, said during a panel session at the National Governors Association’s winter meeting in Washington. “I think that the very loud hand-wringing over the prospects for major municipal-bond defaults is entirely misplaced,” Zandi said.

EU Debt Crisis - Moody's Warns It May Downgrade Ireland Again - CNBC Moody's warned on Tuesday that it may cut Ireland's credit rating again, pointing to the huge bill for cleaning up its banks announced last week, a weak economic recovery and rising borrowing costs. As well as the bank bill, Moody's said poor recent data shoed a cloudy outlook for the recovery of domestic demand and pointed to the sharp rise in Irish bond yields since its last rating action in July. "Ireland's ability to preserve government financial strength faces increased uncertainty as a result of (these) three main drivers, which together would further increase its debt and aggravate its debt affordability," Dietmar Hornung, Moody's lead sovereign analyst for Ireland, said in a statement. ...

Moody's:Aug Global Spec Grade Default Rate 5.0% V 12.3% Yr Ago | iMarketNews.com WASHINGTON (MNI) - Moody's said Wednesday that the default rate for global speculative-grade debt fell to 5.0% in August vs. 12.3% a year ago, while it was 5.1% in the U.S. and down to 4.: The trailing 12-month global speculative-grade default rate fell from 5.5% in July to 5.0% in August, said Moody's Investors Service in its latest default report. A year ago, the global speculative-grade default rate stood at 12.3%. The ratings agency's default rate forecasting model now predicts that the global speculative-grade default rate will fall to 2.7% by the end of this year and then edge lower to 2.0% a year from now. ... iMarketNews.com Moody's:Aug Global Spec Grade Default Rate 5.0% V 12.3% Yr Ago Bloomberg Default Rate Will Fall to 2% Next Year, Moody’s Says